How to Use Twitter Lists for Lead Generation, Influencer Marketing and Beyond

Twitter is likely to already play a huge part in your day-to-day role. The platform can be used for networking, lead generation and connecting with industry influencers, but are you really using it to your full advantage?

For many marketers, their answer to that question is “no”... Even if they don’t realize it.

Twitter has several lesser-known features you can use to boost your productivity on the platform, and generally make your life that little bit easier.

One of those are Lists - a tool that allows marketers to stay on top of the hundreds of accounts they’re following, and use the information being published to their advantage.

Here’s how you can use Twitter Lists effectively - whether it’s for lead generation, influencer marketing or beyond.

What are Twitter Lists?

Unsure on what Twitter Lists actually are?

Here’s your answer: Lists are a simple way to group together similar accounts based on a common denominator. For example: You could have a List for leads, and another for influencers you’d like to work with.

But the power of Twitter Lists goes way beyond just grouping similar accounts.

You’re able to view specific List feeds, which only contain updates from the people on said List.

You can use these List feeds to your advantage by keeping a watchful eye over the content being shared by members, and identifying routes to work with them.

For example: If you’ve got a Twitter List of readers of your blog, you might spot somebody looking for a product you offer. It’s easier to see, respond to the tweet and promote your services because their initial tweet is less crowded in your reader-specific List than it would be in your standard feed.

Get the gist?

How to create Twitter Lists and add people to them

Are you convinced to start using Twitter Lists?

...Great! Let’s get cracking.

Create your first List by heading over to your profile, then clicking the Lists tab and pressing “Create a New List”:

Next, add a name and description for your list. This should be as accurate as possible - especially if you’re planning on creating a few.

Here is also where you set the privacy settings for your List.

Lists should be private if you don’t want other people viewing them (like a list of clients that’s available for your competitors to poach), or public if you don’t mind:

Now it’s time to move onto the fun part: Adding people to your List!

To do this, visit the account you want to add. Click the three dots next to the follow button; you should see a button to “Add or remove from Lists”:

All there’s left to do is select the List you want them on, and your work is done!

Accounts who’ve been added to a public List receive a notification. Your sales prospecting is unlikely to be effective if people know they’ve been added to your List of leads!

4. Your staff list

Public Lists are visible to anyone who clicks your profile and hits the “Lists” tab.

Why not create a List of people who work at your company, and make them visible to people browsing your profile? They’re obviously interested in your brand; encourage them to engage with your staff on a personal level, too.

Creating Lists of employees also makes it easier for people visiting your profile to identify who works there - pointing them in the direction of someone who could help to bring them on-board.

You can use Twitter like a pro by creating Lists of influencers in your niche that you’d love to get the attention of. That way, you can regularly engage with the content they’re posting - whether that’s a response to their tweet or sharing their latest blog post.

You could even use this List as a way to secure guest posts at huge industry sites. Use your List to keep an eye on the content they’re publishing and engage with the editor to get on their radar.

I’ll bet they’re 10x more likely to accept a pitch from you if they recognize you as a fan.

8. Your promotion network

Take note of the people retweeting, liking, sharing or responding to your tweets.

If you can do the same back, those people become your fans - who’re more likely to continue supporting you on Twitter, helping you build a promotion network on the platform.

For example: If you publish a new blog post, share the link to your Twitter profile. The promotion network you’ve built up will contain a bunch of fans who’re likely to engage and lend a hand with promotion, meaning you can meet your content marketing goals and boost the number of eyeballs on your new piece of content.

10. People who’ve attended a conference

If you’ve visited a conference, keep in touch with the people you’ve met by adding them to a Twitter List.

Why? Well, along with keeping a record of who you’ve met (and where), browsing the feed for your conference List could help to nurture leads - or people who express an interest in your product.

Let’s say the Sendible team went to a social media conference. We add everyone we met on the day to a Twitter List, and spot one of the members expressing their need for a social media management tool. We could jump in there and recommend ourselves.

Because we’ve already got a connection from the conference, they could be more inclined to take us up on our offer.

Elise Dopson is a freelance B2B marketing writer who helps businesses generate results through online marketing. When she’s not writing, you’ll find Elise curled up with a great cuppa tea … she is English, after all!